Discovery Communications

Does the color red really make bulls angry?

posted: 04/11/12

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As seen in "MythBusters: Red Rag to a Bull."

DCL

Finding: BUSTED

Explanation: Spanish matadors began using a small red cape, or muleta, in bullfighting around the 1700s. Ever since, it seems, people have perpetuated the color-charged myth that red makes bulls go wild.

An 1,800-pound bull can hook a grown man with his horns and toss him 30 feet in the air, so the MythBusters set out to find a way to test this myth — carefully. They decided to put makeshift matadors into an arena, each holding a flag of a different color, and wait for an angry bull to see red.

The red, blue and white flags got equal, half-hearted attacks when they were motionless. In order to elicit an aggressive charge response from the bull, the flags had to be waved.

Turns out, the color red isn't what causes bulls to attack. In fact, bulls don't seem to have any color preference at all. They'll charge whichever object is moving the most, which means this old myth can get tossed right out of the ring.